tagged.

i've been tagged. by vickie.
at least i think i am the suzanne that she tagged.
but for all i know, she meant another suzanne & now i am the one responding - in which case, i am a bigger dork than i thought ... and while i'm not entirely sure what this means - to be tagged, here goes:

jobs i've held
ice cream scooper
babysitter
short-order cook
busgirl
nanny ( i feel this is a step up from babysitter as it came with some hefty jack, a jeep wrangler & a country club membership)
restaurant hostess
waitress (too many seperate waitressing jobs to count ... two of which i quit - because over my dead body was i going to wear those black reeboks they wanted me to wear.)
cocktail waitress
store manager
bookstore girl
preschool teacher
kindergarten teacher
receptionist
data entry girl at insurance company (sticking hot pokers in my eyes would have been a preferred job)
afterschool program girl in charge
summer artsy-fartsy camp counselor
product developement girl & sender of kajillion faxes to india.
jewlery designer
cut + paste website girl
currently: movie maker tutorial girl

movies i can watch over & over
fargo
my cousin vinny
little miss sunshine

guilty pleasures
candy
the sun
wine
the dance/trance/electronica on my run list.

places i have lived
darien, ct.
rye beach, nh.
roanoke, va.
boston, ma.
venice beach, ca.
rockport, me.
south portland, me.
louisville, ky.

shows i enjoy
lost
the office
m*a*s*h reruns

websites i visit daily
running blogs

places i have been on vacation
windham, ny.
quebec
montreal
sun valley, id.
steamboat springs, ut.
bar harbor, me.
peurto vallarta, mex.
anguilla
san francisco
florida
saluda, nc.
st. thomas
peurto rico
st. maarten
antigua

nicknames
zanne
zuzu
suz

awards
best actress in a play competition
1st place (ag) 5k
3rd place (ag) 4 miles
do finishers medals count? i got 5 of those. 4 for half marathon. 1 for a marathon.

do i tag someone now?
hmmm....angie, betsy & robin. tag, you're it.

my new countdown

i keep getting up earlier & earlier to try & beat the heat for my morning runs.
and so, on my way to the pool to "run" this morning,
at 5:45.
in the heat. already.
i decided i have a new countdown.
the countdown to when i can sleep in past 5 am.
that would be the day after the marathon.
october 22.
i can sleep in.
74 more days.

humid days and mondays always get me down

it was 80 degrees when i went out at 6:30 am for this mornings' 6 miles.

monday's are "endurance runs" - today my run was crazy slow. as was last monday & the monday before that. slow runs usually result in me thinking i suck & then i get to wondering how i'll ever knock 21 minutes off my marathon time if i'm running at a pace that i ran this morning. and so i have a mini-panic. i do this well. and write to coach wondering if the word endurance is another word for slow. i'm hoping its normal. its ok he says. and the heat doesn't help things. oh yes - i forgot about how the heat just sucks the life out of me. am going with that.

my husband asked me when i'll stop having the mini-panic over a bad run; and wracking my brain to try to find the reason for it & just realize it was a bad run. nothing more. nothing less.
i'd like to know the answer to this as well.

and as the day goes on, i realize that i feel sort of crappy. which in a way makes me happy. cause it gives me a reason. maybe my run wasn't slow cause i suck - maybe it was slow cause i felt crappy & just didn't know it yet at that early hour under that blanket of humidity.

monday runs are hard.

closure

i got up this morning at 5 am to drive 25 minutes to run 3 miles. thats a lot of effort to run 3 little miles on an easy day in an easy week. but this run on this route just had to be done. it's the route that begins and ends at my childhood home. the same home that currently has a for sale sign out front.

i wasn't a runner growing up ... i just ran occassionally in high school. it was more of a casual, sporadic thing. but this was my route. around pear tree point. exactly 3 miles. always - it never varied. down the street, cross the post road, past the pretty houses, over the stone bridge, down to the little harbor & the beach, up the big hill, down past the farms, over the stone bridge again & back home.

smell the salt air.
watch the fog lift.
see the sun come up.
stretch on front steps of childhood home one last time.

cross training. the surfy way.

last friday - as on every friday ...
i had a choice: 3 miles or yoga.

so, i went surfing.

i had a surfing lesson 2 years ago ... and remembered, that, in addition to being fun as shit - it was hard & a kick ass workout. so i totally figured an hour of surfing would suffice. plus, when the hell else was i going to get to substitute surfing for a run? ah. like never, dude.

so me & my bff suit up, get our shore review & hit the waves. our instructor was my cousin who owns a surf shop with his brother. the very same shop where they hand out red bulls like they are candy. if you are ever in rye beach, nh ... you must go.

so we're floating. we're floating. and my cousin is regaling us with tales of his travels all over the world ... runs a surf shop in the summer & the rest of the year, travels to points south where the waves are big to teach surfing. in my next life, i want his life.

so he chats, and then suddenly, pushes the board - with you on it - and yells "paddle, paddle, paddle!!!!!" and then "pop up! now! up!" you got it you got it! oh! not so much!

my favorite was when he'd spy the next wave & right as he pushed you off into the surfy unknown - will i get up or won't i? he'd say, "this is it, this is your wave" ... dude. that's a lot of pressure. this may not be my wave.

i resist the urge to ask how long it usually takes people to get up the first time. i remember the last time i did this & it took me 30 minutes to get up. that was the first & last time. and i was drop dead exhausted.

now, i didn't have my watch on, although i have to admit i was tempted to wear my heartrate monitor - just out of curiosity ... you know, in that would the effort match a 3 mile run sort of curiosity. but i'm gonna guess that about 20 minutes into lesson i got my first wave in. am sure my heartrate would have registered off the charts - the excitement & sheer joy was an absolute blast.

i got a few more in after that ... and my cousin left the boards for us to keep using ... i stayed in & got a couple more -- could have done it all day. totally channeled my inner surf girl.